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StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm trailer details eSports improvements

Blizzard has added a lot of snazzy features to StarCraft 2 in preparation for the expansion Heart of the Swarm, and yesterday dropped a new trailer demonstrating the shiny additions for multiplayer and eSports. Goodbye, epic matches being scrapped after one player crashes, and hello, players being able to step into the child-sized shoes of their heroes by recreating games from replays.

Blizzard has added a lot of snazzy features to StarCraft 2 in preparation for the expansion Heart of the Swarm, and yesterday dropped a new trailer demonstrating the shiny additions for multiplayer and eSports. Goodbye, epic matches being scrapped after one player crashes, and hello, players being able to step into the child-sized shoes of their heroes by recreating games from replays.

Yes, now when a player drops from a game, the game can be recreated from the replay file, which even handily suggests points where something went wrong. This same tech lets players take over the game of any replay they're watching at any point, so you and your chum can become Flash and Jaedong, then see how quickly things go off the rails once you idiots take over their perfect macro.

You can also now view replays together with others, like in the original StarCraft. Spectating is made a little easier too, as the minimap now draws attention to combat, nukes, and Nydus Worms. And SC2 has added stats, stats, stats galore.

These aren't newly-revealed features, of course. Why, you can play with them right now in Wings of Liberty, as they were added earlier this week in patch 2.0.4. If you're waiting for the expansion before you fire up SC2 again, though, here, enjoy Blizzard demonstrating it all for us.